Scarborough Fair
by Biancaneve
Summary: Songfic, referencing the well-known ballad of the same name. Five years after a hypothetical season 3 finale, a drunken, reflective Allan thinks about herbs, their meanings, the past and the future.


_Historical note: I'm totally cheating, as neither Scarborough Fair itself nor the song about it were in existence until the later middle ages. But hey, if Matilda can have parsley a few centuries before it arrives in Britain, I'm keeping this._

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_**Scarborough Fair**_

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_"There's rosemary, that's for remembrance." - Hamlet (IV, v)_

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_Remember me to one who lives there;_

_She once was a true love of mine._

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Well, I had that one pegged from the start, didn't I? Always said Robin'd be the one to get the glory when all was said and done. Not even five years on and they're singing songs about him now. His name's so famous he could walk into any tavern in England and get legless without paying for a single pint - or get laid without lifting a finger.

Pity he's not alive to enjoy it. (And more's the pity the bloody troubadour that started it all had to show off his skill at tragic verse and put in the bit about the death of the Great Man, so that his loyal friends can't even enjoy the benefits on his behalf... Telling people you're one of Robin Hood's _Merry Men_ doesn't carry quite the same prestige.) Still, if being dead's the asking price for fame, they can keep their Ballad of Allan-a-Dale for a few years yet, thanks all the same.

But there's this other song I've been hearing lately, that makes me wonder. If I hear it at just the right time of an evening out - _after_ the loud-mouthed sot at the end of the bar starts sounding like a great philosopher, but _before_ he starts looking like a philosopher and his twin brother - I can start to think Robin wasn't the only one of the old gang to get himself immortalised in song.

It's not the first line, not on its own, even though the two of them did move there after it was all over, instead of going back to the Holy Land like they'd said when they first came home. That wasn't a surprise - they'd said they were only back for long enough to finish what they'd started, but I think we all knew right from the start that they wouldn't be leaving England again. Easier to dress it up as duty to his country, than admit that once the novelty wore off she no longer felt at home in her own.

But still, that doesn't mean a thing - go to Scarborough in August when the fair's in town and you're sure to see plenty of women. (Even if there's only one who's earned herself a reputation for setting up shop right next to the cart of any travelling quack, and making it known that she'll treat for free anyone who doesn't feel like having their last pennies wrung out of them by a charlatan. Caused a bit of trouble at first, that did, but shysters like that aren't exactly known for their bravery, and they soon got the message that trying to shut her up meant tangling with her sword, not to mention her lanky husband and half the carpenters' Guild. There's not half as many men peddling dodgy miracle cures at Scarborough fair, these days.)

Nah, it's the next bit that gets me. It sounds mad, alright, but you try living with Djaq and John for three years - well, two and a half, with time off for bad behaviour in the middle - without hearing enough rubbish about herbs that you wouldn't see _something_ in that line when you were plastered.

It's almost enough to make me wonder if our old mate the Earl of Bonchurch hasn't sold one of his songs at last, (and whether it's worth trying to tell him he owes me a share of the profits for providing the inspiration). Except, if it were him, he wouldn't have made it past that second line. He'd have gotten hungry just thinking the words.

_Parsley_

That one's easy, of course. A man won't get far in life without knowing that chewing a sprig of parsley'll get rid of the stale smell of the night before, if he feels like trying his luck again the next morning. Or that if the meat they're selling at the alehouse is boiled in parsley sauce, then he'd better avoid it if he doesn't want to spend his evening retching into a gutter. They sprinkle it on corpses that have to wait too long for burial, so that ought to be enough of a clue.

That's what parsley does, see - it disguises things that're rotten. Parsley's the swaggering step and rattling tongue that keeps you from recognising a man who thinks the truth is just a lie that nobody's caught yet. To that sort of man, life's a joke with the punchline missing – all manner of twists and turns and clever embroidery (not to mention "a man walks into a tavern"...) - but with nothing to sustain it and nowhere to go.

You want to be careful of a bloke like that, no matter if he's a stranger or your best mate. He'll do whatever it takes to make sure the joke's not on him in the end.

_Sage_

The first time she asked if it grew in England, nobody had a clue what she was on about. She kept calling it by the Latin name, see, and it was only after she rattled off a great list of all the things it was good for that John worked out what she meant. _Salvia, _she'd been saying, and confusing Robin no end, 'cause of course he didn't know about anything as useful as plants, only what it meant for scholars and priests. _Salvia, salvere._ To save.

Turned out her idea of salvation had nothing at all in common with the priests'. Their way of saving you is to tell you to believe in things - _body and blood? Mate, I've seen plenty enough of both to know they don't look anything like that_ – and make you wait till you're dead to find out if they were right.

I bet it's never occurred to them to say that they believe in _you_. Words like that have a way of echoing inside your head, and in the right accoustic conditions (a castle for instance, stone walls and big empty halls) the echo can get so loud that you'll do whatever it tells you.

_Rosemary_

Doesn't mean you won't kick yourself for not listening earlier, of course. Doesn't mean you won't curse yourself for taking no for an answer the other times you tried, or resent the men who said it to you.

Doesn't even mean you won't sometimes wish you'd stayed right where you were and kept wearing the wrong colours, when you twig that either way all you'd have had were memories. And if you're honest, you liked the old ones better, the ones you took with you the first time you said goodbye without getting a chance to say a word. The memories of winks and smiles, jokes and laughs and sly touches. The crack in her voice as she recites your goodness like it's the Apostles' Creed.

Because the second time you leave, everything's changed. The winks are earnest, gooey eyes; the jokes are gone and she's all pretty, feathery speeches. The hearty laugh's turned into a little girl's giggle, and none of it's for you, anyway. The voice that rasps for want of a drop of water is praying to a God called "I Would Never Leave You." And the last memory you'll have is an old man talking about birds, and as far as you can see out of the corner of your eyes, hers don't even twitch your way. New memories like that make it hard to get much joy out of the old.

_Thyme_

Time heals all wounds? Well, you try telling that to a man who's lost a hand, or a woman with a bloody great sword through her gut. But when it comes to the ones you can't see, yeah, from what I've seen, I'll buy it. Apparently a year away is enough time for the world's most revolting couple to get it out of their systems and start acting like normal people again. Long enough that when they come back, things're almost like the good old days, though never _quite_ like it was.

Give it three years more, and even John "Today is a good day" Little is sitting by his fireside dandling a littl'un on his knee. (Last I heard, our Kate's already got another on the way. Wonder if they'll ask me to be godfather this time.) Robin died with a smile on his face and Marian's name on his lips, but I reckon if he'd had to wait longer to follow her, even he would've stopped moping; not forgotten her, of course, but remembered how to be happy with a world with one less person in it.

That's the thing – it's not like any man's going to pine away for ever. One true love for your whole life is all very well for pigeons and dead heroes, but the rest of us aren't quite so stubborn. I can honestly say that at that party that passed for a wedding, I danced with a light heart, _and_ every girl in Locksley village.

And now, well, there's a lass who sells fruit in Rochdale marketplace. Sharp tongue, loud laugh, and blue eyes that can stop any pickpocket dead in his tracks. (Not that I've tried - I'm a reformed man, I am.) Next time I'm up Scarborough way, I must tell Will and Djaq how fond I am of veg these days. They'll have a laugh at that one, for old times' sake.


End file.
